No good deed goes unpunished
by atilas1122
Summary: A simple story. Less white gloves. No reparation wave. What happen when you don't limit yourself to monsters and start going after other kinds of criminals? What else hide in the cracks beside would be superheroes?


High-pitch screams erupted all around as I was thrown through the thin wall of the massage parlor. Sure I was super strong, but not more resistant than anyone. Beside the inhumanly lighter part I mean. Anyway, I landed/crashed into massage table and atop the very naked man that was a moment sooner enjoying the service of the middle age Korean women currently howling like a demon in the corner. Beside the sharp pain I could feel running along my spine, this ear shattering cry was the most painful thing I could feel at the moment. Damn this women had lungs. I couldn't focus on that for long though because the giant slab of meat who had thrown me charged through the rubble, bellowing like a mad bull.

I rolled to the right to avoid his stomp and punched his knee, making him stumble and grunt in pain. That slight delay was all I needed to get up. Still enraged, the yakuza Shatei twisted around toward me, fists flying wildly. That's good. I moved forward, into his personal space, he swings to the left, I punch his bicep, he groan, he swings to the right, I punch his bicep, he screams, rinse and repeat. Slowly, he moved, or staggered backward rather. Unbalanced by the pieces of false wood cardboard and the man thrashing under him, he stumbled, giving me the opening to kick him right between the legs. He bent forward, gasping for air, his eyes unfocused by agony. In a comedy, I guess he would have fallen forward on his knee, unconscious, and I would have said some witty comment. This isn't a comedy. I grabbed his head and slammed my knee right into his face, one time, two times, three times, four times, before releasing him.

He crashed on his side, nose broken, one tooth missing and at least another one broken, confused, defenseless. I did not let him go so easily, not now. My closed fists hammered his face and chest, hitting until his skin ruptured, until even more of his teeth were broken, until I felt the bone of his jaw break, until his chest cracked and he started crying and moaning. Even so, I did not stop, I couldn't stop. I won't say that some kinds of veil masked my sight or some other crap like that, in fact it was more like I was perfectly aware of what I was doing, each details of his visage, the sensation of my fist against his bones, everything. It's just that I wasn't aware of anything else until this rage I felt surge inside me was slightly satiated and he lied under me, bloodied and broken.

My breath slowed down as the adrenaline stopped flooding my system and I retook conscience of the world. That was a stupid move on my part, the kind that could have gotten me killed. I shouldn't have left my anger cloud my perception, especially not there as anybody could have walked behind me and put a bullet in the back of my skull.

I got up from the beaten down body and looked around me. The screams had diminished, most of the girls and clients probably had run off by now. The only ones left were probably the man trembling under the ruined massage table and the girl crying in the corner in fetal position. I probably had no more than five minutes or less before the reinforcement breaks down the door to shoot at everyone, so there was no time to lose.

I fished out the man's wallet, grabbing his cash and anything valuable before rushing back into his office. As I said, I had no time to peruse through the mass of documents stored there, so I simply grabbed a worn out backpack sitting in the corner and filled it with as much paper as I could along with a couple stacks of euros. Once that was over, I jumped back through the same window I had used to enter and not a moment too soon as I heard the sound of half a dozen people rushing into the massage parlor, shouting like football fans after their team wins' the final.

For my part, I emerged onto the back alley, sliding on the grime and filth that covered the pavement. The gutted trash bags leaking their insides on the street and the layers of graffiti had not changed a bit in the half an hour I had spent inside, beside one thing that is. A car had been parked into one end of the alley, its headlight shining down the alley and bathing everything in it in a bright white light, myself included. I heard a shout almost immediately followed by the crack of a pistol and the sound of bricks shattering where I was standing a mere second before. I jumped upward, grabbing a window sill some four meters high. Told you I was light. In one movement, I grabbed the yo-yo around my waist and sent it high to wrap itself around a chimney pot. The next instant, I was airborne, almost flying, as I was pulled toward the rooftop all the while supersonic lead whistled around me.

I wish there was all I could say about this flight, a great feeling of weightlessness and freedom, but it wasn't. The backpack over my shoulder was filled with the written ghosts of pain, misery and despair disguised into numbers and code words, money gained through sex and blood and probably a small revolver by the weight. My right thigh was burning and bleeding from the bullet that had grazed it as, unfortunately, my suit didn't protect against bullet, or knives, or even punches. I was kinda expecting better than faux-spandex for a magic suit, but apparently it only comes in skin-tight unbreakable format. I can't tell you how hard it was to convince Tikki to keep the motocross gear under when I change so I had at least some protection from hits.

… I don't know why, but I have the feeling that I am losing more and more people as I go on. Maybe I started a little too heavy. Cold opening are not for many things beside old comic books and crime shows. Okay, then let's add a little back story to clear up some questions.


End file.
